


Misguided Ghosts

by cinderfell



Category: RWBY
Genre: Alternate Universe - Normal Life, Depression, F/F, depressed yang, ghost weiss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-30
Updated: 2014-08-30
Packaged: 2018-02-15 08:16:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,461
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2221977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cinderfell/pseuds/cinderfell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Living girls didn’t fall in love with ghosts, although the same couldn’t be said about ghosts falling in love with living girls.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Misguided Ghosts

**Author's Note:**

> written to, you guessed it, misguided ghosts by paramore
> 
> i wrote this in one sitting and only glance-edited it. i'll have a cleaner version up later.
> 
> but man do i love angsty freezerburn. that said, it's never weiss helping yang? so here's a bit of weiss helping yang, and weiss indirectly helping herself.
> 
> i don't really write ruby well so she's a bit ooc so forgive me

When she came to the apartment with her stuff in tow, Weiss couldn’t stand her.

The girl was barely out of her teens and, judging by the hoodie she wore, a student at the local university. She came with textbooks, instant coffee, and dark circles under her eyes from late nights. Weiss knew the look of a worn out college kid who had no idea what they were actually doing, living life from one test date to the next. Weiss used to be like that too.

Weiss watched her from the windowsill as the girl roamed around the apartment, fingers tracing every crack in the wall and inspecting every inch of her new home. Weiss hated it. She hated seeing this girl touch what once was hers. She hated the way the girl put her belongings where hers used to be. She hated the way the girl smiled at everything around her, like in the chaos of college she’d finally found something stable. Something hers.

Weiss hated it.

Weiss hated her.

The people before the girl had all moved out in a hurry. They claimed they heard strange noises at night. They saw shadows move when all was still. They felt something touch them lightly, like a trickle of ice water down their spine. It was all her. It got the job done. The longest anybody had ever stayed in her apartment was three months.

She always scoped things out from the window at the far end of the apartment. It was her place. She’d watch them from there, trying to figure out how to push them out of the apartment. In life, Weiss had sat under the window and wrote.

She liked the solitude. She liked having the place empty. She liked pretending this was still hers. She liked pretending she was still made out of flesh. Having other people and their things around broke the illusion.

The girl had long blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail. She looked like she had decent hygiene, at least. Most of the people who rented the apartment before her had been college kids. A few of them had questionable hygiene at best and were complete pigs at worst. Her sense of smell hadn’t followed her into her new ‘life’, so smell never bothered her, but she could only imagine. Just seeing the mess they’d make could send her into a fury. Lucky for them, she didn’t really consider herself malevolent. She did move soap and shampoo around rather pointedly, though.

The whole _not malevolent but not entirely nice_ thing was kind of her MO. It wasn’t even her ghost thing, that was what she’d been like in life too. Some habits die hard.

Weiss was never violent about driving them out. Honestly, nothing she did was even remotely scary. She let them see her shadow every once in a while. She’d toss their keys under the bed. She’d turn the faucet on and off. It always scared the shit out of them though, regardless of how harmless her actions were.

The first night the girl slept in the apartment was the hardest for both of them. The girl tossed and turned in her bed, covers tossed aside and sheets tangled around her feet. Her entire body glistened with sweat, limbs convulsing like she was enduring electrocution or some other kind of torture. Fingers clawed at the mattress as the girl mumbled names desperately, too faint for Weiss to make out.

At first she was annoyed. The first night and the girl was already having nightmares? Great. Weiss’s new roommate was a giant baby. She hoped that would help her get the girl out. But as the nightmare went on and on, Weiss felt her disdain slip away and something similar to concern take it’s place.

Watching the girl writhe from her nightmare almost made Weiss get up and run her fingers across the girl’s cheeks in a calming manner to hopefully stop the girl’s dream. She shifted forward a bit, drifting a few inches from the windowsill where she’d been watching. Then she stopped. She’d seen other people have nightmares before, ones that made them scream and cry for loved ones out of sight. She’d never been bothered by them before, so why the blonde girl?

Casting one more look in the twisting girl’s direction, Weiss drifted off towards the bathroom, troubled by the way the new tenant was making her feel.

The next few days made her head spin. The girl had nightmares every night, crying and murmuring for hours on end. It would go on and on until Weiss felt like she was going to go mad. Then it would suddenly stop, usually because the girl would wake herself up. She’d sit in the darkness, legs drawn up to her chest, waiting for dawn’s light to creep through her window before she’d finally drift back to sleep.

Weiss was getting increasingly frustrated with the girl and herself. Watching the girl fall apart every night made it hard for Weiss to hate her like the people before her. There was something about the girl--the way that she held it together in the light of day and shattered in the darkness--that made the ghost feel like she understood her.

After weeks of listening to the girl’s nightmares, Weiss finally admitted to herself that she was interested in the girl. While the girl was off attending classes, Weiss roamed around the apartment, gently touching the girl’s possessions to try and get a feel of who she was from the energy left on her belongings. She’d figured out how to use that ability when the apartment got rented out for the first time since her death. She’d accidentally touched the tenant’s watch and got force-fed the sob story about how the watch was their father’s. Needless to say, she avoided using it. She didn’t care about the people who moved in. Well, usually.

The girl was a former softball player, probably high school level. After sneaking around the boxes of things that hadn’t been unpacked, she found the small army of trophies. They were all for softball, so she hadn’t just been a casual player. When Weiss ran her fingers across the shiny surface, she felt the golden glow of pride that emanated from the objects. There was something else there, too. Something heavy and dark that clashed with the pride. It was hard to tell what exactly it was, but the way it made Weiss feel just from touching it made her think of depression.

The darkness wasn’t just on the trophies. It hung around the entire apartment, coating all the girl’s belongings in a weight that made it hard for Weiss to concentrate on anything  but the darkness. Steeling herself, she waved away the feeling.

She hadn’t figured out what she wanted to do in college yet, judging by the confusing mix of emotions that covered all her textbooks and school-related materials. She had a sister--no, a half-sister. Younger than her, and so full of life. Weiss had to pull away from something with the sister’s energy on it because it was so potent. It was a drastic change from the girl’s dull energy.  _Ruby,_ the energy called.

There were tons of little things scattered around the apartment. She liked pineapple on her pizza. She loved strawberry ice cream and had a tendency to drink a lot even though she wasn’t of age. She used to have a girlfriend but they broke up after her mental health started deteriorating. They were still friends, the fondness for the other girl clear as day to Weiss. For a moment, Weiss became irrationally upset at the information. Then she stopped, hand hovering above a gift from the ex-girlfriend.  What’s wrong with me? She shook her head. Getting into the girl’s head was getting to her.

_Yang._

The name was the last thing she let herself find out. There was something personal about it to her. She’d never learned the names of any of the other renters. She hadn’t cared. Everything in the room had whispered it at her when she’d touched it, but she’d blocked it out. Standing with her her hand on a picture of the girl and her sister, the girl looking years younger and much happier, Weiss finally let the name reach her.

It was like something blossomed in the emptiness of her chest.

_Yang._

The sudden slam of the door made her jump, hand pushing the picture over so it landed face down on the counter. Nervously, she looked at Yang, who stood looking at the picture with a peculiar frown on her face. Walking over to the counter, she passed through Weiss, making them both leap apart. Weiss felt like fire was running through her lifeless form, while Yang shivered. Glancing around the room, Yang’s frown deepened. Reaching out, she put the picture back in it’s place.

Weiss sighed in relief as the girl moved to put her stuff down. She couldn’t understand why she was so nervous. It wasn’t like Yang could see her. Anxiously watching the girl from across the room, she wondered what the girl would do if she knew Weiss was there.  _Bad idea, Weiss._

Weiss had developed an odd relationship with Yang. She didn’t hate her like the others. She understood her, in fact. Watching the girl struggle was what made Weiss decide she’d leave her alone. Coexisting with the blonde wouldn’t be that bad, would it? That said, when the standard nightmare happened a few days later, worse than ever, Weiss broke. She decided she was going to step in.

Surely this girl needed to talk to someone? But she didn’t seem to be showing any signs of doing that, which worried Weiss. She was utterly confused over why she worried, but she did. The problem Weiss had was how could she get Yang’s attention to convey such a message? The veil between life and death kind of made it hard for traditional methods of saying  _you need to see someone_ to work.

Yang’s phone lay on the bedside table charging where it did every night.  Ah, yes. That would do. Tentatively, Weiss reached out to touch it. Her hand phased right through it. She had that problem sometimes, where nothing she’d try to touch would actually listen to her. She’d also never been able to carry objects more than a foot, so she was in for a rough time. Willing her hand to actually grasp the phone, she sighed in relief when she actually managed to grab it.

Then, the tricky part.

Focusing on keep her hands on the phone, she slowly began moving towards the counter. About halfway to the counter, she got a little cocky.  _Hey, this isn’t too hard!_ The cell phone dropped out of her hand with a loud clatter. Wincing, Weiss turned to look at Yang, who was still locked in her night terror. Slowly, Weiss started her journey again.

When she got to the counter she felt faint. Carrying the object had really taken a lot out of her. She’d thrown objects across the room before, but carefully and quietly moving something was a whole nother thing. She let the phone land on the counter next to the picture of Yang and her sister. Weiss could feel the raw love coming from the photo. It felt like a cherished possession. If the sister couldn’t get Yang to talk, she wasn’t sure what else she could do to help.

She waited for awhile, just watching Yang shake. After an hour or so, Weiss broke. Drifting towards the bed, she looked down at the girl. Her blonde hair was a tangled mess, her shoulders slick with sweat. Every once in a while her hands would float up for a few seconds as if reaching for someone. Her pink lips parted, strangled cries coming from them.

She was beautiful. She broke Weiss’s heart and she was beautiful.

When Yang’s hand reached once more for a person just out of reach, Weiss couldn’t help herself. She gently touched the girl’s hand with her ghostly one. At first there was nothing. Then Yang’s hand closed around Weiss, somehow finding a solid grasp on the spirit. Weiss was on fire. There was so much life running through her, straight from the girl. She was so warm it physically hurt Weiss.

It was over in seconds. Whatever brief force that allowed Yang to touch Weiss was shattered by the blonde’s eyes opening wide. For a moment, Yang looked directly at Weiss, and Weiss nearly cried because she felt like she was being  _seen_ . Then Yang’s eyes rolled back and her eyelids shut and she was back asleep. This time it was peaceful.

Weiss stood there until dawn, just staring down at the girl. She was so alive. She was plagued by darkness but she was still breathing, still fighting against the heavy weight of herself. Weiss felt her warmth whenever they’d pass through each other.

Weiss loved her.

It hit her like a fucking truck. Like a train. Like a rampaging bull. Like the entire goddamn universe fell on top her.

She loved the golden girl even though she herself was nothing more than a shadow where there shouldn’t be a shadow. She was the cold spot where Yang walked, the thing that made her feel like she was being watched. She was a ghost and she loved a girl that was ridiculously  alive.

It hurt her almost as much as it filled her with joy her.

Weiss stayed away from her the next couple of days. She floated absently around the apartments nearby and watched their inhabitants. She’d almost never left the apartment since her death. The apartment had always been hers so she’d never felt pressured to leave. She couldn’t shake the feeling that the apartment wasn’t hers anymore. It was Yang’s. She didn’t really belong there anymore. What was the point in sticking next to her? Living girls didn’t fall in love with ghosts, although the same couldn’t be said about ghosts falling in love with living girls.

It was only when she felt a different presence in the apartment that she finally returned a week later. Peeking out from the bathroom, she watched Yang lead a teenager with peculiar silver eyes into the apartment. Weiss recognized her immediately as the sister from the photo. Had Yang called her after Weiss did her message?

“So, yeah. This is my apartment.” Yang gestured around. Ruby’s grin was immense.

“Wow, I can’t believe you own your own place now!” She exclaimed.

“I mean, I’m really only renting it so I don’t own anything--”

“And I’m so happy you called me.”

The older sister smiled at her, relief visible in her eyes. “I would’ve called earlier. I just… I thought you might be mad at me.”

“For what?” Ruby was suddenly serious.

“You know… for shutting you out. For shutting you all out.”

“I’m just glad that you’re opening up and trying to get help. We weren’t mad at you. We were just really worried. We didn’t even realize how bad it was until you called.” Ruby reached out, gently taking her sister’s hand. Yang sighed, although it sounded like a choked sob to Weiss. It broke her heart.

“I didn’t want to worry any of you. I’m supposed to be your role model and I let you down.” Yang hung her head, prompting Ruby to get up on her tiptoes and kiss her forehead. Yang froze for a moment, before pulling her sister into a hug. It looked tight from where Weiss was, and although Ruby started making noises that sounded like  _you’re crushing me_ , Weiss wished she could’ve felt that.

When Yang finally released Ruby, the younger sister sighed and smiled happily. “So… what made you want to ask for help?”

“Uh,” Yang rubbed the back of her neck. “That’s kind of a funny story. Question: do you believe in ghosts?”

Weiss was frozen in place.

“Uh, what?” Ruby leaned back and raised her eyebrows at her sister.

“I mean, I’ve been having a pretty shitty few weeks, right? So I plug my phone in by the bed and try to go to sleep. I, um, start having this nightmare and I’m reaching for this girl that I can’t really see, but I know that she’s going to make everything better. Then I finally reach her after weeks of never being able to get to her and I wake up and I feel like my hand is frozen solid, like somebody’s holding a bag of ice to my hand or something. So I open my eyes and the girl from my dreams is there holding my hand.”

“What then?” Ruby’s eyebrows were drawn together.

Yang’s face flushed. “I fell back asleep. But when I woke up again, my phone wasn’t by the wall. It was over on the counter--” She gestured at it. “--by the picture of you and me at that picnic.”

“So, you interpreted that as your dream girl telling you to go get help?” Weiss was just… staring at the two of them. She’d been in Yang’s dreams? She’d been the one Yang had been reaching out for? “Isn’t it possible that you just left your phone on the counter?”

“I mean, I guess.” Yang’s blush was getting brighter. Then she got excited. “But you didn’t hear this part! I’d been feeling cold spots and stuff since I moved in, right? All this weird shit was happening. So I got curious and looked up deaths in this apartment building to see if maybe I was being haunted. Guess what I found?”

Weiss watched, numb, as Yang pulled out an obituary from an old newspaper. It had her face on it. “Look, a college girl died in this apartment. And the kicker? This is the girl in my dream.”

“Yang, didn’t you say you couldn’t see your dream girl all that well? You were tired when you thought you saw her in real life too. Maybe you decided you were haunted and when you saw this girl’s face your mind just gave her face to the dream girl.” Yang was frowning at her sister trying to rationalize the situation. “I mean, do you really believe you have a friendly ghost looking after you? Is that really more believable than your subconscious telling you to get help?”

“Okay, so maybe it’s not more believable, but it’s a hell of a lot more exciting to have Casper the friendly and super attractive ghost hanging around.” Ruby chuckled at that. Yang shoved the picture in Ruby’s face, laughing. “No, really! She’s super cute! If she were alive I would date the shit out of her!”

“Yang--” Ruby smiled and pushed the picture away, only to have Yang push it back.

“I mean, if she’s been spying on me in the shower I’d be honored!”

_“Yang!”_

Staring at the two girls, Weiss wasn’t sure how she felt. Yang looked… happy. The sister looked happy too. Hell, Yang had called her cute, which made her feel happy. But at the same time… something was different. The apartment didn’t feel like hers anymore. It didn’t feel like she belonged in it. And it felt nice, in a strange way. It made her feel lighter, like she was finally free of shackles she hadn’t even noticed before.

It was the sudden brightness that got her attention. Turning, she squinted into the brilliant whiteness emanating from the window. There was nothing normal about the light. It was blinding. Otherworldly. Weiss turned to look at the sisters, who were hugging again. Neither of the living girls seemed to notice the window glowing.

Weiss understood.

When she was alive, she’d always read about passing on through doors or through light. She’d read plenty of books about ghosts trapped in the mortal world by something. In her time at the apartment, never once had it crossed her mind that maybe she was one of those ghosts. All the time she spent driving away tenants had been her clinging to the shreds of her old life. Maybe that was her unfinished business. She hadn’t known how to let go.

Weiss looked at her golden girl one more time. She looked happier than she had in the entire time Weiss had coexisted with her. Yang felt alive being with her sister, it was plain to see. As much as Weiss wanted to hang around and watch her recover and grow as a person, she knew she had to let go of the world of the living.

Tearing her eyes from the girl and her sister, Weiss stepped into the light.


End file.
